Pages From My Diary - A Birthday

March 20, 2010

12:00 MN

“Dhoom…” 

“Damm…”

“Dhomm…”

“Happy Birthday da!”

Our noise was superseding the train’s rhythm. The compartment was fully awake with those birthday bumps and midnight party. We were just 14 in number but made a hell lot of noise so that all other 58 passengers woke up. Aged people got a smile over their face, middle aged men turned red in anger, other young college girls in the next compartment could not tolerate the enjoyment we had!

Agony, jealousy, pity and anger filled up every other person’s face but we all had a happy mood splashing cream over one another, taking photographs and playing as if it was a weekend at corporate! Our TTE gave a right entry to make us calm. He was middle aged and checked us for liquor bottles. May be he would have expected us to have one so that he can have one!

Its 15 minutes past one when everyone just showed signs of tiredness. One by one we started moving towards our berth and it looked as if a huge chaos came to an end. No one noticed what path the train took up to reach the Central, Chennai. Usually all trains from south will be reaching Egmore but ours was a festival special train!

Chennai was as dirty as it could be. The sultry climate, salty breeze and hot sun was not much felt when we are with our friends. A short walk, electric train, a long walk and finally we reached Chepauk! We have already booked our rooms there through a friend of a friend of a friend! We relaxed ourselves in the most comfortable cot, had a fresh bath with the special salt water of Chennai and went out for the breakfast! From our place, the half completed new secretariat for the State Government stood amazing and the geeky pair Sathish and Navanee had their chat over the facilities in that building!

It was a usual morning otherwise and we all are quite excited for the evening match! The preparations started in the early evening around 3’o clock when we all started standing in the queue for the 7:30 cricket match. We all had a uniform yellow jersey in favour of the home team. We all are well dressed typically to match the cricketing scenario. The companies did free advertisements on us! We were wearing green LED glowing coolers for 7up, a yellow jersey for Aircel and a turban for the Super Kings! I was much concerned about the uniformity than the home team! I literally hated the home team except for their captain who captained the Indian Cricket team!

In recent times Indians are much concerned about the T20 matches especially the IPL which was the prime reason for our Chennai trip! We all had On-Duty on our attendance sheets in college and were not at all worried about the consequences!

Even before the game started we all took seats and started cheering up along with the cheer girls! The match went on very well and it was a nail biting finish with a tie! My first ever cricket match at a stadium was a tie! I was much delighted and moreover the home team lost at the super over!

A splendid birthday for my friend, a wonderful cricket experience and overall a much awaited trip with my friends! A much excited day and a dream came true moment for me! (I have seen the cricket stadiums only in my dreams!) May be the birthday boy could forget but never can I!!

P.S:- 22^nd and 23^rd March, 2010 were full of enquiries for that trip!! ;)

Pages From My Diary - Miss You

18^th February 2011

1:00 PM

A cloudy afternoon turned sultry with lots of inconvenience. I then decided rightly to get into an air conditioned movie theatre with my friends to change my mood. In fact I am not at all worried of my girlfriend’s departure to a faraway tourist spot but felt a small difference than what I thought in the morning. 

6:30 AM:

“Do I need to get blessings from you for my birthday? Won’t you wish a blank happy birthday atleast? I was expecting your call since 12 MN. Anyway, am moving far away. Meet you in March. Bye :-@”

That was the first message I saw that morning. I am not that bad to forget her birthday but was good enough to choose early to bed than wishing her mid-night! I felt bad with the last angry smiley placed with a sweet ‘bye’. What else could be the most joyous moment if your GF is out of town for 10 full days!

I replied with a simple birthday wish and never even cared to ask for a sorry either. She replied spontaneously with a change of topic. She was much worried about missing me for whole ten days for which I am happy to the core. She was in complete love when she said “it would have been really nice if you were with me in this trip!” But for me, that would resemble a trip to Vegas only for the beach and not for girls! Brushing aside those thoughts I simply said, ‘Let me enjoy these days dear’ with a winking smiley.

She became really furious and bet with me that I would miss her atleast for a moment in those ten days. I was delighted at the sight of a bet, much of a winning kind and accepted. We both were quite confident of winning the bet. 

2:00 PM

Finally, I and my friends decided on a horror story which would certainly the most expected movie that day. It took nearly 10 minutes for my friends to reach theatre. I felt alone with some strangers staring at me. It is really hard to push time waiting for someone! I usually come late to theatres where she would be waiting with the tickets!

I took out my mobile and thoughts started running from Nokia Xpress Music 5130 to the theatre, their movie together and finally ended up with thoughts of her! This is the first time I am waiting for someone and wonder why I could not stop thinking of her. I just remembered it and not missing her for sure!

Huh… Thank god. Friends came and movie went on with full of horror and I had no time to think of her. We all came out of the theatre for the break and had a nice chat over the movie’s progress and proceeded towards the canteen. He was caught hold of the ‘Corn Puff’ in the canteen shelf and remembered her again!

5:00 PM

The movie ended with a horror note as expected and we had mixed feelings about the movie. Everyone started to give their own views for the movie and started walking back. City traffic has hit the peak but it was quite less noisy than his inner voice that shouted ‘turn left, it’s Reliance Fresh! ‘

I reached back home and just writing this by 9:00 PM and overall a great day to remember. One last question to think about, “Did I miss her?” May be we will sort this out after ten days! ;)

Best of My Dreams - Daughter

Its 9’ O clock and he returns back home from the office after a hectic scheduled day. He was totally tired but enjoyed every work assigned to him. Thinking of all the good happenings and happy moments he smiled to himself and started getting ready for the dinner. He awaited much for this food for the whole day and he could not get even a spare minute to spare for his food. 

Before the dinner gets ready, he emptied his hands by keeping the mobile aside and started emptying his pockets. It was a cluster of currency, some bills and lists. Placing all those papers in his table, he started to open one by one and started arranging them to claim money from his office the next day. He threw away the lists and kept on piling up the bills under his paper weight. 

He had a beautiful house at the river view side and with a small cute family. His mother and father stayed miles apart at Madurai. His wife Priya and daughter Aishu were literally half sleep when he entered. But Priya managed to make her child sleep a bit and then started heating up the food for him. She called him twice but he was busy sorting out the bills and lists. She became tired of calling him for dinner and so put all those food in a hot pack and insisted him to take them before sleeping. He smiled and continued his work.

He stopped at a list which contained a very familiar handwriting to him. It was bit crushed and literally had torn edges. He paused for a moment and got up to take his food. Those were her handwriting. That ‘HER’ was his love a long ago. Though it was one sided, he could not forget it over years. He could easily recognize the handwriting as he had loved it and had many samples in his closet too. If it was a 10 years before, the paper would have got ironed and kept safe inside his closet. With this thought he just walked away to have a very little food as his wife insisted and started for a small walk in the lawn. 

A lonely walk always provides a great strength to the mind. He thought of all his cherished memories in his college days and smiled alone. He thought of friendships he had, gifts, mobiles, messages, fights, outings, movies and what not. Finally he ended up in calling his best friend just to get disappointed as no one picked it up. He wanted badly to hear from someone and as he lost his hope with a live voice, he started playing a recorded music from Bryan Adams. It is ‘Summer of 69’ and he thought how life changed from school to college and college to company. 

 “If I had the choice
Yeah - I'd always wanna be there
those were the best days of my life”

He dropped his ear phone with those lyrics having a smile with a tear and that showed how much he missed everything he had. He walked in again with the thought of sleeping but caught hold of that crushed paper once again. He took that gently, wiped all those wriggles and straightened it and looked for a while, then made it to his closet!

Aishu woke up and looked at him saying, “You still dint sleep dad? dinner?”

“Yeah baby. Love you. Good night” he replied.

Aishu kissed him and bid him good night. He loved that love than anything else!

People go on search for love very far but it subsists very close to the heart!

Best of My Dreams - Woman

11:00 PM Saturday,

“Beep.. Beep.. Beep..”

11:45 PM Saturday,

“Koi gaaye dhun..
Koi nacche Chun Chun..
Koi Kahe sun sun..
Jud gaya Jiya se jiya..
Jiya se jiya.. Koi gaaye dhun.. Koi nacche Chun Chun.. Koi Kahe sun sun.. Jud gaye Jiya se Jiya….” 

Nokia 1661 rang vibrantly, but none took the call. Usually he picks up the call within the first ring and he has never allowed his callers to hear his caller tune. She turned pale as the missed call number kept on increasing from 1 to 8. He never picked up and she could not figure out the exact reason and more over she could not bear with the IVR constantly replying “the subscriber you are trying to reach has not answered your call“.

Clock ticked 12 AM and she is not in the mood to get to her bed. She was totally confused with his odd behaviour. She kept the phone in redialling mode and speaker on. She started negotiating what could be the reason.

 5:00 PM Saturday,

“I have got great news for you dear!” he exclaimed.

She could grasp his reactions and could easily guess something related to his work place. “News next. Treat first!!” she said.

“Huh.. Ok treat is fine. But at least you could have asked what the news about na?”

“Something related to your office. Right?” she gave a i-know-it look.

He was surprised a bit and said “Yeah.” But he lost that enthusiasm what he had in his first statement!

“Tonight you are free right? We shall go for a dinner then. You pay and let it be the treat for that great news!”

“You are concerned only about the treat and not about the news uh?? Damn” he said losing all his patience and still softly he added, “A party is arranged to congratulate me on the new project deal and tonight am not free!”

She didn’t expect this and she wanted him to be with her that evening. He could guess that from her face. 

He continued, “Bar dancers from Le Meridian are called for the party and there would be little alcohol and lots of fun!” 

“You are not going I suppose. If you still want to be with those dancing girls and alcohol better leave me”.

“Hey, it’s just a party and why you react much?”

“Hmmm.. you mean to say, you dancing with alcohol and bar girls is not a thing to react about?”

“Come on yaar. I have never been to other parties before. It’s arranged for me and I have to be there”.

“I am leaving. You do whatever you wish”.

“Better to die than to be with you! Damn!” he replied in utmost temper. 

She started walking as if she never wanted to look at him again. She was in complete anger for 5 long hours. She dint even thought of making a call or texting him. She made up her mind and drying all her tears, she texted him 

“I will never disturb you. I think am not the right mate for you. You better choose someone who suits you the best. I can’t be waiting all along for your arrival from the party after marriage. Its better we depart. Good luck. Bye. “

She is not a girl who gives up all of a sudden. She is passionate in her love and she expects secure life from him. Now too, she sent that just to verify whether he has gone to the party or not. She will compromise easily even if he has gone to the party!

No reply received to the message for 45 minutes. She lost her patience and called him. No one attended the call.

After the 1^st Missed Call:

 “He would have been busy watching those girls dance. How can he just do that? I said him million times not to attend such parties. Anyways, just a dance. Let it get over. I will deal with him tomorrow!”

After the 4^th Missed Call:

 “Oh. He is drunk too. Idiot. Had he ever thought of me and my future? He lost his stability and could not even take the call uh? I should have thought before loving him. cha..”

After the 7^th Missed Call:

“He started dancing with those girls too. How idiotic I am to choose such a guy. That is all. Its break up”.

She turned pale… tears dried up and she started thinking of the sweet memories of their proposals and gifts. “I need to return everything to him and should never look at him again!” she said to herself.

After the 10^th Missed Call:

 “The Subscriber you are trying to call is Out of reach” the speaker sounded little different this time. She turned furious and could not withstand her anger. “How dare he can travel and out of the coverage area and that too without informing me? He is not the same guy whom I loved. He changed a lot. I don’t want this guy.”

At that thought, she remembered his last words “Better to die than to be with you!” She is totally confused with those words. She started thinking about him deeply. The phone would have got switched off but why it says “Out of Reach”? She wanted to talk with him badly and she started missing him. At the same time, she had second thoughts of whether he has made a suicidal attempt!

She decided to visit his room which was 4Km from hers. But she was afraid to travel alone at 1:00 AM in those empty streets. She pulled on time with the memories of him for the early morning. Confirming his suicidal attempt, she started praying god – in fact different gods to save his life from danger. 

5:00 AM Sunday,

She hurriedly started from her home in her scooty. She considered every second to be late in saving her lover’s life. She rushed hard past the scarce traffic main roads and reached his room.

It was 5:15 AM- still dark and sun is yet to show its face. Her hands chilled down to earth and could not resist her tears she rushed to his room. She had positively taken all the nearby ambulance numbers and hospital emergency numbers from the yellow pages. 

The door was closed from inside and she could see him lying motionless through the window. She broke into tears and generated all her power to break the wooden door. With the fourth fierce shoulder punch, the door opened.

“Bangggggggggg!!!”

“Hey.. what the hell are you doing here at 5??” he woke up suddenly and shouted. He could not guess what is happening.

“Dear.. You alive?!?” she exclaimed and thanked god a thousand times!

 “You came here to check whether am alive or not?” he was confused and irritated. “you could have atleast called me na?!”

Both looked at the same direction where the phone was scattered with every possible spare part apart. He said “the vibration would have caused this! I am sorry!”

She hugged him with the utmost love and they both reassured their love and desire for the happy life!

P.S: Things happen lightly. People make it complex! Woman are efficient than men here too!! ;)

Best of My Dreams - Pun

A busy day once again, Bangalore is at its high after the technological boom this year. Many fresher zoom in to the professional life with a great career in their thoughts and slackened engineering graduation in their hands!

One such day,

Our hero is an Engineering graduate from Tamil Nadu. It’s just a month over after he joined at one of the best service companies in the world. He was really excited and started off from his home a five minutes earlier so as to feed his bike in his own salary for the first time. He had his own plans for the evening, a get-together of all his college friends at Bangalore who have been recruited along with him. He texted his friends a very great morning and started for the office. His enthusiasm was just because he has missed his friends much with the long gap of 3 months after the college life. He was completely overjoyed with the thought of get-together at Garuda Mall.

When he reached his bike he found that his bike needs immediate attention of its family doctor – the next street Mechanic! He pulled his bike through huge difficulty and finally reached the place to find it to be closed. There was a hanging board which stated – “all my income today are donated to the Government Buses!” He was confused a bit with that board in his hurry but understood a little later that the mechanic would not open the whole day. He decided to park his bike back at his room. 

With a hell lot of sweat, he found his watch stating a different time than usual. He will be usually late by 5 minutes, but then he was nearly late by 20 minutes! 

Bangalore is a busy city where all the hi-fi buses are crowded and local buses are nearly empty. He took a normal faired bus just because he is late! To his astonishment he found the bus was nearly full leaving a single seat near a woman who would be aged around 28 to 30. The travel was nearly 45 minutes. Our hero was really tired walking to and fro to the main road thrice and he has no other option left. He stood near the seat waiting for an invitation from the woman. She never turned up. 

“You are not in Tamil Nadu dude. It is Bangalore. You can take that seat for granted”, an inner voice shrugged him up.

He took the seat immediately with that voice and feeling something odd to travel with a girl for the first time in bus he tried to stand up and leave the seat empty. At that time, the girl looked up with a seductive smile and so he sat back. 

He started with a smile and said, “Hi, I work for a MNC. You?”

She replied, “oh you too. Great. I am a prostitute!”

He was dumb for the next 30 minutes of travel. 

Comedy or a Brain-Drain?!

Best of My Dreams - Regret

A silent start to the journey of life begins when a child begins to stand up, walk and run on its own. We start alone, parents’ guide us for the first 10 years, friends shower their care for the next 10, a love that loves more than you do for the next 10, children’s love for the next 10 and once again in life we start walking alone!

As I started walking I noticed a clean road, crystal clear sign boards and every driver following the traffic rules. I wonder how would be this if I were walking on the platform of India rather over the London Bridge. I stood over the pavement of the heavy traffic bridge witnessing the calm river. Thames was flowing clear and silent. 

Walking along with the memories of your missed ones has its own feel rather walking with your loved one. A lonely walk could always bring the unsaid memories up in our thought rising from the heart! 

A mistake mistaken for a noble cause, a love loved for no reason – A flash of thought that threw me back to India.

The last day of my college life, everyone knew that those were the last few minutes together and exchanged one last gift to their best friends whom they never want to miss! Exchanging of slam books and autographs, wishing best for everyone for the future and it marked the end of something which everyone, both criticized and cherished, the most.

The final bell rang, and it was one last bell we would hear which we hated the most in our college life! She was standing firm with her soft hands curling over the steel fence expecting me to say those words which we both had in our mind in common. I stood silently looking at her eyes which was restless and looking for a word of relief. A love unsaid for the past four years. I had a card to give it to her but she had nothing except an open thought. 

She started, “Bala, All the best for your future. You will get to a very high position in your life. Hope we will be in touch always. Anyways, best wishes for the rest of your career!”

I had a mixed feeling whether to say or to give the card straight away. I responded with a smile which gave her a dilemma state whether to walk away or to wait for the reply as I have never spoken alone to her earlier. She still had the firm grip over the steel fence as I stretched my hand forward with the card. She got that card, turned back wished me all well again and started walking in the corridor. 

I stood resilient at the same spot looking at her direction waiting for her to turn back atleast once. She walked and faded away. I reached my hand to the same steel fence which held her hand one last time barring my first hold. It was just a 'Thank You' card but she kept that closed as she feared she will fall for it! She walked away without opening her heavy heart and also the card.

If she have opened her heart or rather I, it would have been 'We' instead of 'I' standing over the bridge now - cherishing those days!

With the thought of my last day, a missed chance which changed my life, a tear drop rolled over the cheeks and hit the surface of the water creating ripples. Within seconds ripples vanished and river seemed undisturbed again!

Life moves on. With time, the ripples vanish but the path traversed by the tears over the cheek remains forever reminding of the Love – The First Love!